Rabbi Michael Leo Samuel
My history with Rabbi Shlomo Riskin goes all the way back to 1977. He visited a Hillel Academy in Binghamton, New York, where I taught Talmud many decades ago. At the time, I knew he was already a well-respected rabbi who had brought many Jews back to Judaism when he served as the founder of the Lincoln Square Synagogue in Manhattan.
Rabbi Riskin has often taken considerable heat from the Orthodox establishment, which always criticizes the maverick Modern ...
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One of the best-known blessings Orthodox Jews recite every day is the blessing, “Thank you God for not making me a woman.”
The recent transformation on the cover of Vanity Fair’s 22-page cover story featuring Caitlyn Jenner, formerly known as Bruce, raises a number of fascinating questions pertaining to Halacha as well as Jewish ethics.
To begin with, persons wishing to undergo transsexual surgery are a minority—in fact one per million men and even less with ...
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An excellent introduction to an ancient philosopher
By Israel Drazin TOP 1000 REVIEWERVINE VOICE on May 20, 2015
Philo (about 20 BCE to about 50 CE) of Alexandria, Egypt, is one of Judaism’s great philosophers. The noted scholar Harry Wolfson wrote in his book Philo that Philo was the first Jewish philosopher who “contributed anything new” to Jewish-Greek philosophy. Rabbi Michael Leo Samuel offers readers a good introduction to this famous thought-provoking philosopher ...
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Note: I wrote this back in 1988 and it probably needs a new revision. But for those who find such topics interesting, here it is for your enjoyment.
Q. What were the types of stones used in Aaron’s breastplate? What were the reasons a particular stone represented a particular tribe?
A. Ibn Ezra in his commentary to Exodus 28, noted that we really have no way to positively identifying the stones that were set ...
Book Review: God and Politics in Esther-
Yoram Hazony: Title: God and Politics in Esther 2nd Edition. Publisher: Cambridge University Press; 2nd edition (2015)
ISBN-10: 1107583454; Price $18.27 on Amazon. Rating ***** out of 5 Stars.
Reviewer: Rabbi Michael Leo Samuel
Yoram Hazony’s exposition of the Book of Esther is priceless. In my Judaism 101 class, everyone read a little bit from God and Politics in Esther and the discussions that ensued made the ...
Learn More ShareCategories: Anti-Semitism, Bible, biblical theology, Current Events, Political Commentaries, Talmud, Zohar, and Midrash